I Wasn't There
by imWITCHIN
Summary: Blaine runs into an olf friend and ends up telling Kurt the heartbreaking reason he really left his old school. Written in honor of Day of Silence for the LGBT community.


I Wasn't There

Trust me, I don't own Glee. If I did there would be a lot less Mr. Schuester.

Blaine propped the door to the Lima Bean opened for Kurt to waltz inside, pulling his gloves from his pale fingers delicately as Blaine yanked his off with his two front teeth.

"Blaine!" Kurt looked at him, horrified as Blaine looked back, his eyes wide and his mouth full of glove. Pulling it from his mouth he smiled at Kurt.

"What? Did I drop something?" He looked around the floor animatedly and then at Kurt, amused.

"They're 100% Italian leather, Blaine. If you want to eat cow that badly we'll go get you a burger," Kurt said as he fixed a stray curl that had somehow broken free of the papier-mâché dome that was Blaine's gelled hair. Blaine laughed, grabbing Kurt's hand before it could do anymore damage to his hair, kissed it softly, and then let the entwined fingers drop between them.

"Ok, I promise next time I'll take my 100% Italian leather gloves off with my hands like a normal pers-," Blaine stopped in sentence as the girl two people ahead of them in line turned to look at the pair, her eyes wide and her cheeks suddenly flushed. "Kerri?" His voice was quiet and breathless, like someone had just punched him in the abdomen. She was walking towards them, leaving her place in line to stand directly in front of Blaine. "How are you? I haven't seen you in-, "Blaine was cut off again. The girl, Kerri, threw her arms his neck, stifling his speech and causing him to drop Kurt's hand so he could pat her awkwardly on the back, taken by surprise. When she finally released him, Blaine looked at Kurt, whose eyes were looking at him with burning curiosity.

"Umm, Kurt this is my friend Kerri. We went to school together before, ya know. Kerri this is Kurt, my…um…boyfriend." Blaine smiled a little at the last word, first at Kurt then to Kerri. Kurt's eyes took in the girl in front of him. She was short, about Rachel's height, but a little stockier. She wore knee high boots over her dark skinny jeans with a plaid coat buttoned over a scarf that Kurt had almost both for himself at H&M a week before. Her face was round with a huge, droopy set of hazel eyes.

"Nice to meet you Kurt," she said quietly, smiling at him warmly. Despite the smile, her droopy eyes gave her a look of chronic melancholy. She looked back at Blaine, her gloomy eyes growing progressively more dismal. "It's been…almost two years," she practically whispered. Blaine nodded at her, his own kicked-puppy face going into full effect. They shuffled forward in line and then it was Kerri's turn with the barista. Placing her order, she turned back to face them, eyes never leaving Blaine.

"You two go sit down, I'll get this one, Blaine," Kurt said, gathering that Kerri had something to say to Blaine that it seemed she wasn't comfortable saying, or didn't know how to say, in front of Kurt. The pair nodded and went to sit in a booth in the corner of the shop.

Nudging him softly, Kerri smiled as she said, "He knows your coffee order." Blaine chuckled. "He's gorgeous, Blaine," she gushed as they slid into the vinyl booth. He nodded with what could only be called pride, his eyes finding Kurt, standing by the counter, hand on hip. Tearing his gaze away from his boyfriend, Blaine looked back at Kerri, face falling.

"How've you been?" His hand reached for hers across the table and cradled it softly.

"Better. The same. I go to therapy a lot. It's been pretty shitty." Kerri didn't look at him.

"I- I'm so sorry Kerr. I just didn't know how to handle it. I should've been there for you but I was too wrapped up in what I was feeling; how it was affecting me. You deserved a better friend. I couldn't face you." Blaine choked his way through the last sentence, squeezing her hand gently.

"You're right," she said, tears silently falling from her heavy-lidded eyes. "I deserved better. The worst thing that ever happened to me, that ever _could_ happen to me, and my _best friend _of over ten years just ran away. Ran away when I needed him more than ever." Her eyes were full of anger now, and her fingernails sunk into the flesh on the back of Blaine's hand before shoving it away. "And now, after almost two years- no call, no messages, no visits, no cards, nothing - and I run into you at a coffee shop in Westerville with your boyfriend. " Kurt was prancing towards them now, somehow balancing three coffees in his small hands, smiling as he set them down on the table and scooted in beside Blaine. Kerri scooted out of her seat and grabbed her drink as she wiped the angry tears off her face. She glared at Blaine one last time.

"Everyone misses you Blaine, the whole choir. I hope you're happy with your choice." With that, she stomped out of the shop, the jingling bell on the door less dramatic than her exit demanded.

Kurt sat very still, his hand on his boyfriend's knee as Blaine squeezed the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger, brow furrowed in anguish. The wrinkles in his forehead relaxed a bit as Kurt moved his hand to rub his back soothingly. Hearing him murmur something along the lines of "get out of this damn place", Kurt grabbed Blaine's coffee and with his other hand lead him out the obnoxiously jingly doorway.

Ignoring Kurt's comment about how he would drive if he wanted him to, Blaine climbed into the front seat of his Volvo and slammed the door. Barely waiting for Kurt to close the door on his own side, Blaine sped out of the parking lot, taking Kurt aback and causing him to spill a little hot coffee on his pants. Wincing at the burning sensation in his thigh, Kurt hurriedly used napkins from the glove box to dab the medium drip off his Tom Ford trousers. Looking up from his failing attempt to salvage his slacks, Kurt gasped. They were going at least a hundred miles per hour on a road leading to God-knows where, Blaine white-knuckled on the steering wheel. The tiny Volvo roared as he pressed the gas pedal even further, as if daring whatever was chasing him to catch up.

"Blaine. Blaine. **BLAINE.**" With the third yell of his name Blaine slammed on the break, throwing the pair of them forward, veering off to a shoulder beside a clearing in the woods and slamming to a complete stop. They sat there- silent except for their heaving breathing- for a few moments before Blaine flung himself free of his seatbelt and ran out of the car to the clearing. Kurt watched him, seemingly paralyzed to his seat. Reaching a large log in the middle of the grassy area, Blaine hauled it over his head before- *WHAM*. He slammed it back into the ground, screaming as he did so. He picked up other things at his feet: sticks, rocks, dirt clods, throwing them at the surrounding trees with all his anger in every pitch.

He eventually ran out of things to throw; either that or he exhausted himself. Sinking to the cold ground, Blaine let himself cave in to angry sobs. By the time Kurt had reached him, sat beside him and practically cradled his smaller companion in his long, graceful arms, Blaine's sobs had calmed to sniffles and tiny heaves.

"Sometimes," said Blaine, thickly, "I guess there just aren't enough rocks." Kurt chuckled at the fact that at a time like this, Blaine still managed to lighten the mood with a Forrest Gump quote. If there had been a question in his mind that maybe someone had switched his old crazy Blaine with a new crazy one back at the Lima Bean, it was gone. Kurt kissed his temple softly.

"Mind telling me what happened back there? What she said to flip that switch in you?" He asked tentatively, not wanting to push too far, but dying to help him in some way.

"Kurt," Blaine sighed, not looking at him in the face, but instead down at his hands, currently preoccupied with drawing pictures in the dirt. "I haven't been completely honest with you. I haven't told you the whole reason why I left my old school."

"You don't have to tell me everything Blaine, if it's too hard."

"No. No. I want to. I need you to know. I need you to know even if means you'll think less of me. Even if it means you'll think I'm even more of a coward than you already do."

"Blaine I-," Kurt started.

"No. Just listen."

"Kerri and I have known each other since we were four years old, and have been best friends since we shared a bag of Goldfish in kindergarten. We were inseparable. And for ten years, that pretty much never changed. Her twin brother, Roman, and I were never that close, though. He was a soccer star, honor student, and even drum line major; a real All-American. When we started freshman year I was just starting to get comfortable with the fact that I was gay, and I realized that I needed to tell someone before I exploded. Just so someone would know, you know? I couldn't tell my parents, I wasn't anywhere near ready for that Chernobyl. So I told Kerri. She had already guessed of course, it wasn't that hard to see. The thing was, Roman heard me tell her and from that moment on he was always weird around me." Blaine took a moment to scratch his head and reposition himself as his leg fell asleep. Kurt didn't move.

"Whenever I was at Kerri's he was always…around. He would stand outside the door to her room while I was there, just starring, thinking I didn't see. At school he would always be close by, watching me. It made me so uncomfortable that one day, while I was waiting for Kerri to get home I just confronted him about it; called him out. The effect was instantaneous. He just sort of…crumpled onto his bed and started telling me about how he was "struggling with who he was and what he wanted". Blaine sniffed and rubbed his neck.

"Was he…in love with you?" asked Kurt, tentatively.

"No, no he was never in love with me. And I never loved him either. Not like that at least. But he confided in me. He wanted to tell someone in his other life, his "normal" life; his best friend, Tony. Another soccer player, not a total waste of a person, or at least that's what I thought. Who was I to tell him no? The first person I had told was _my_ best friend. So he did. He told him that he was gay. And-" Blaine cut off.

"And?"

"And he didn't take it so well. It wasn't that he was mean about it; he just…wasn't comfortable with it. He shut Roman out of his life. And then he did the worst possible thing he could have done at that point. He told everyone else on the team. "

Kurt gasped. "He didn't."

"He did. And everyone else, well let's just say they were even less cool about it than Tony. A lot less. Roman had no one except me and Kerri. But I guess it goes without saying that our walking down the hallway side-by-side didn't do either of us a huge service. They called us every horrible name you can imagine. Parents called the school asking if there was anything that could be done for our removal. I started considering the idea myself. That's when I first started looking into Dalton. I tried to convince Roman to come with me but he couldn't leave Kerri. And neither could I, if I was being honest with myself." Kurt reached out his hand to wipe at a tear that had somehow managed to escape Blaine's eye and was slowly making its way down his cheek, then rested Blaine's hand in his own, stroking it gently as Blaine continued to talk.

"It was hell. Absolute hell. I was better off than he was. I had other friends from theatre and choir and such but Roman? All his friends, every single one, had turned on him. He was miserable. And no matter how many times I told him that it was going to get better, that it _had_ to get better, he was never really convinced. And then one day everything just fell to shit." A shadow fell over Blaine's eyes at this. What had been sadness and defeat turned to pitiless ferocity.

"He was in the shower after soccer practice, trying to finish before everyone else came in so as not to make anyone mad or uncomfortable." Blaine gave a mirthless "HA. Never wanted to step on toes, that Roman. Never provoked a single person." Kurt stared at him, preparing for whatever was coming next.

"They pulled him out of the shower by his hair and threw him in the corner. Then they took their wet towels and whipped him. They whipped him until he had huge, red welts all over his body. He was completely naked." Kurt gasped, picturing it and choking back a lump that had suddenly appeared in his throat. "And then they just…" Blaine took a deep breath as if to steady himself. "Then they just pissed on him. They threw him down, beat him to a pulp, and then they _pissed on him_. And what then? They just left him there. Naked and covered in urine, like an animal. Cowards." Kurt shot up to his feet, hand over his mouth, tears flowing freely.

"No. No. No they didn't. How…? How could someone…? How could _anyone_…?" But he was lost for words. Blaine continued as if he hadn't heard Kurt.

"I heard about it from some idiot on the team bragging about in the library later that day. I tried calling Roman, texting him, anything, but he wasn't answering. So I called Kerri and told her what happened and about how Roman wasn't responding to any of my calls. She called her parents. None of us could get a hold of him." Blaine took a few long steady breaths before continuing. "They went to look for him and found him at home." A few more breaths and a cough. "He'd hung himself. In the closet in their basement." Kurt sank to his knees. He wanted to throw up, but the heaves were dry. As Kurt calmed down, Blaine continued.

"That was on a Friday. The next Monday I was at Dalton. I couldn't stand to look at any of their faces even one more time. I was furious; at the team, at the administration and the students who stood by and watched this guy, whom at one point they had all adored, be tortured, at Kerri, and at myself, for not stopping him. I couldn't even go to the funeral. Kerri needed me and I pushed her away. I pushed everyone away. I was a coward. I made myself forget about him, about Kerri, about everything and everyone in that school. At Dalton I became someone else, a different Blaine Anderson. The real Blaine Anderson." Blaine scooted until he was right in front of Kurt, grasping his hands firmly and resting their foreheads together. "The Blaine Anderson that loves you, that would do anything to protect you. The Blaine Anderson that hates Karofsky because of what I know people like him to be capable of."

Kurt choked back a sob and grasped Blaine's face in his hands, kissing him fiercely, relentlessly. Blaine kissed him back, holding him so close he felt his ribs might be crushed.

"Listen to me," Kurt whispered, not letting Blaine's eyes leave his own. "None of that is your fault. None of it. And you are not going to lose me. Things are going to get better. Roman, he's in a better place, a place where nothing and no one can hurt him. And you are not a coward. You are human, beautifully flawed." They sat there, holding each other, until the sun faded.


End file.
